Birds of a Different Feather
by Roseoptic
Summary: The rise of "the Penguin" was a story everyone in Gotham thought they knew, including Dr. Susan Bohner. However, when Elisaveta Lazarev, better known as "the Owl", turns up on her docket, Dr. Susan is in for a different interpretation of the Penguin, his rise to power, and the broken Owl who was by his side every step of the way.
1. Chapter 1: Owl

**Chapter One**

 **Owl**

Dr. Susan Bohner was making her rounds at Arkham Asylum just like she did every work week. Today, there was a new name on her racket. A name, Susan was actually worried about having to deal with. Susan did not work Arkham's hard cases. She had never even _seen_ people like Edward Nygma or the "Riddler" in person, never mind spoke to them. However, there sitting right on her patient list was the name "Elisaveta Lazarev", who was better known as the "Owl". She was the _Penguin's_ right hand man. There were rumors about the two's relationship, but nothing had been determined one way or the other. Elisaveta's arrest and trial had been all over news. The evidence against her, while most definitely true, was anything but concrete. With someone as powerful as the Penguin gunning for her release, Susan was incredibly skeptical if the woman would remain in the "care" of Arkham for even _half_ of her sentence.

Susan walked into her office with trepidation and found the woman already waiting for her. There weren't any cuffs, which made Susan a bit nervous, even if there was an armed guard waiting outside the room. Elisaveta didn't warrant that type of attention, which was why she was on Susan's docket. Despite her associations and unstable status, Elisaveta had been ruled mostly harmless. Even the non-corrupt cops had seemed to feel a little guilty putting the woman away, as they viewed her as one of Penguin's pawns. Whether or not that was true remained to be seen.

"Hello, you must Elisaveta Lazarev," Susan greeted, heading to her desk. She hoped that Elisaveta hadn't gone through her desk, but doubted it.

"Lissy," the disheveled woman corrected. Her eyes were foggy with whatever drugs she was being dosed with.

Susan made a mental note to instruct the staff _not_ to drug Elisaveta without her agreement. It made for uncooperative patients. Susan had a feeling Elisaveta was the passive aggressive type.

"Is that what everyone calls you? I thought it was Owl." Susan said, testing the waters with Elisaveta, trying to get a read on her personality. If she was sarcastic, quick tempered, how she reacted under pressure

Elisaveta's reaction was a little bit boring, but boring was safe. "Only my mother called me Elisaveta." She informed Susan. Her tone was casual but there was something a little sharp in her eyes, underneath the drug induced fog.

"Your mother, yes," Susan shifted through Elisaveta's file, which was empty even by criminal standards (the high profile patients tended to have their pasts buried or erased). Susan managed to located the name, "Milena Lazarev. She died a few years ago, didn't she?"

"She did."

"I'm sorry for you loss."

Elisaveta's lips pulled together and she remained silent. Susan couldn't tell if Elisaveta cared about her mother or not. Her tone so far had been nothing but factual. While it was possible that Elisaveta didn't care, it was just as likely as she was hiding it. Working with criminals was twice as hard as the cases that Susan had back when she was in private practice. With civilians you could just _assume_ they cared about their mothers.

"Why don't you tell me why you're here?" Susan asked, dropping the subject of Elisaveta's mother, but filing it away.

"Do you not watch news?" It was hard to tell if Elisaveta was being sarcastic or not.

"Yes, I do. I have your whole file right here. There's a lot here, _Lissy_."

"Most of it unproven."

"Not according to the courts."

"I was acquitted of most charges. The rest was circumstantial at best."

"Do you agree with that?"

"Is that why you're here?" Elisaveta's eyes narrowed, her brown irises seemed to blend with her pupil. It was rather unsettling, "To try to trick me into confessing?"

Susan shifted in her seat, "Anything you say is confidential."

"Unless you get a court order."

Susan had to nod her head, "I'm not here to gather information against you, Lissy. I'm not your enemy. I'm here to help. You don't have to talk about anything you don't want to."

Elisaveta looked away from Susan and out at the grey skies of Gotham. It was raining _again_.

"So, do you know why you're here?"

Elisaveta's eyes slid away from the window back to Susan with an accusatory look. It looked very childish on her face and Susan found herself biting back a smile.

"It's important for me to know if _you_ know why you're here."

Elisaveta let out a small sigh, "I'm here because the courts found me guilty of bribery, forgery, and aiding and abetting to numerous other crimes."

It was almost alarming how little Elisaveta had been charged with. It _was_ alarming how close it had come to a hung jury.

"That's a technical way to put it. But I'm glad that you're at least aware that you did something _wrong._ "

"I get that what I did was _illegal_ ," Elisaveta corrected.

"But not wrong?"

"Is it wrong to do what you have to, to survive?"

Susan pursed her lips, "I believe you were doing more than surviving, Lissy."

Elisaveta gave a little shrug, "When you're from the streets, you have two choices. To play the game or to die. The choice doesn't change once you start to play."

That was a very fatalistic way at looking at the world. Susan struggled to think of where she should begin with someone like Elisaveta. She wasn't like most cases where the beginning was obvious like: why did you kill your mother, what drove you to place that bomb in the middle of the street. Susan didn't know where the best place to start was, but the easiest was the beginning.

"How did you first get involved in the mafia?"

"I didn't really have much of a choice."

Susan found that hard to believe. "How so?"

"My mother didn't exactly get into the country legally." Elisaveta confessed. At first Susan was surprised by Elisaveta's confessional until she realized that Elisaveta's mother was dead and there was no risk of deportation.

"There aren't a lot of jobs for people in that circumstance." Elisaveta elaborated

Susan frowned, "Your file says that your mother was a seamstress."

"She was."

"If she found legal work, why couldn't you?"

"It's different if you're working in the Russian district. They don't ask questions. They don't care."

"So why didn't you work for them?"

"I did, for a while."

"How long is a while?"

"I worked there from sixteen to twenty."

"What happened?"

"It went under."

"And after that?" Susan had a feeling she knew where this was going.

"I went from job to job for a while," Elisaveta shrugged. "The only job that sticked was as Fish Mooney's accountant."

"That's quite a shift."

"Not really."

Susan wrinkled her brow, "What makes you say that?"

Elisaveta frowned a little. It was clear to Susan that Elisaveta wasn't much of a talker and she was struggling to figure out how to keep Lissy talking. She flipped through Elisaveta's file to see if there was anything in there that could help her. Quite by chance, Susan found a small section that dictated what personal belongings Elisaveta had in her room. There were number of books and journal. Just because Elisaveta wasn't a _talker_ didn't mean that she wasn't a story teller.

"Why don't you tell it like you would story?" Susan suggested.

Elisaveta arched one dark eyebrow.

"It's just us," Susan soothed, in case Elisaveta was the easy embarrassed sort, "It can be easier to talk about something if you tell it like a story."

Elisaveta gave another sigh but seemed to give in, "I'm not a snitch," she warned, "I'll skip around if I have to."

Susan nodded, hoping that Elisaveta would skip instead of making things up, "Whatever makes you comfortable."

"Alright... I guess it all started when I went out for coffee with Zara."

"Zara?"

* * *

Zara Gavrilova was not the type of girl who was friends with girls like Lissy Lasarev. They were complete opposites. Zara loved having all the attention on herself. She was friendly, talkative. Lissy felt uncomfortable around large groups, and groups in general unless she knew them well. She was reserved and more melancholy than anything.

However, they had been neighbors when they were kids and Zara was the type of girl that once she attached to someone, she never let them go. So even though they hadn't been neighbors since Zara had moved out of her parents' place when she was nineteen, Zara would show up on Lissy's doorstep every Monday evening before she had work and after Lissy got off work to drag her out for coffee.

It was the same routine every Monday until one day the gossip Zara loved to share with Lissy changed her life.

"You should have been at Mooney's Friday night," Zara said, which was how she started off every gossip session regardless whether or not the gossip in question happened on a Friday and knowing full well that Lissy had never and would never go to a nightclub.

Lissy took a long sip of her coffee, which was her signal for Zara to go ahead and gossip to her heart's content.

"So, I was on break and I went out back for a bit of fresh air. And before you give me a look, this was _Mooney's_. If it were any other nightclub, you wouldn't catch me dead," Zara laughed at her bit of black humor, "out back, but who in their right mind is going to attack Mooney's?"

Lissy wasn't all that informed about mob politics but she figured someone like Mooney had enemies and Zara could very well find herself between them and Mooney if she wasn't careful. Zara however, did not share Lissy's cautionary temperament and Lissy knew that wasn't going to change.

"So, I'm out back for air and I see Mooney's boys dragging this guy off. And immediately I'm curious. He's sort of old and they don't drag off just _anybody_. Mostly they just rough em' up right in the alley, yeah?"

Lissy nodded her head indicating that she was still listening.

"So, I head back inside because I ain't gonna stop them to ask questions. I ain't stupid. But when they get back, I'm still curious. I still have ten minutes of break, so I think, 'hey why not satisfy my curiosity' right?" after another nod from Lissy, Zara continued, "So I go buy one of the more friendly guys a drink. And I ain't even gotta ask what they were doing because they all saw me walk away and all so he just tells me. Guess what they were dragging him away for?"

Usually that was a rhetorical question but Lissy always missed those sort of social cues and Zara had just got used to it after their years of friendship, "Embezzling."

"Is that what it's called?"

Lissy nodded.

"That's my Lis, you know all those fancy words." Zara shot her a proud, little grin, "So yeah, he tells me that the accountant was _embezzling_. And I do mean _was._ You know that the people Fish's boys drag off don't usually come back, poor guy."

Zara shook her head sadly, though she didn't really care. For her it was just a bit of gossip. Growing up on Merry Fox Lane had desensitized Zara to most things, especially violence. Lissy didn't know why she bothered to act like she cared at all, but the last time she asked Zara had gotten angry at her. Lissy hadn't asked again.

"So that was my exciting week. What about you?"

"I got fired from the library."

Zara almost choked on her coffee, " _Fired_? Now that has to be story, you better spill."

* * *

"I don't get it," Susan frowned, "You _had_ other options. Even without a college education you could have swung some job, why turn to the mafia?"

Elisaveta shrugged, "More room for advancement."

Susan's eyes widened. This was why cases like Elisaveta never came to her. It was easy to understand the damaged mind that drove someone to murder their wife. Elisaveta's "rational" explanations for her deviation from the law were harder for Susan to understand. Susan just wasn't buying that it was all just economic reasoning that drove Elisaveta to work for Fish Mooney.

"Weren't you scared? Your friend told you what happened to your predecessor."

"Why would that scare me? I wasn't planning to embezzle."

"He should have gone to jail not been murdered."

"I never said he was murdered."

Susan frowned but couldn't deny it. Elisaveta had been careful to leave that ambiguous, even if the truth was obvious.

"Still, most people wouldn't want to work for an employer who dealt with employees violently." Susan protested.

Elisaveta shrugged and didn't answer. Susan definitely wasn't buying Elisaveta's assertion that she had joined because she _had_ to or because there were better opportunities there (although Susan supposed that a cashier would have never had the wealth that Elisaveta had acquired). There _was_ another reason, Susan just had to find it.

"Why don't you tell me how you go the job?"

Elisaveta's gaze shifted out the window. She seemed to talk more when she wasn't looking directly at Susan. "On Tuesdays, Mooney used to do a hiring drive. People who wanted work would go for an interview." Elisaveta explained, "It made Mooney look good without her actually having to hire anyone most weeks."

"She never hired anyone?"

"No, she did. Thugs who probably didn't live the month. Maybe a waiter or waitress once a month. Usually it was musicians, comedians, people of that ilk, and if they were lucky they would get one gig. It just wasn't as nice as it was made out to be, is all."

"But it worked out for you."

"It did."

* * *

Lissy had told mother that she was going to a job interview, though she had been very careful to avoid answering _where_ she was interviewing. She had only told her because her mother was keen to know where she went when she left the house and because honestly Lissy didn't really know how to dress herself for an interview with Fish Mooney.

The result of the conversation was Lissy being shoved into her only "nice" outfit: a black and grey, cap-sleeved, "shift-dress" that her mother had forced her to buy a year ago and a pair of white heeled ankle boots that weren't even Lissy's but _Zara's_. They were a size too small, if anyone cared for Lissy's opinion. She had even put that stupid product in her hair that made it resistant to the Gotham humidity that turned Lissy's hair into a frizzy mess. She was even wearing lipgloss. All in all, Lissy was dressed up and uncomfortable and she was hoping this wouldn't be a daily thing if she got the job.

There was no getting this dressed up (or at least it was dressed up for Lissy who hadn't worn anything resembling formal clothes since _prom_ ) and being early, so Lissy had been one of that last interviews of the day. The "meeting" wasn't held in Fish's office but on the floor of the nightclub which was empty since the club didn't open until much later. Fish was nursing a cocktail and chatting to lanky looking boy -

* * *

"Was that Penguin?" Susan cut in, almost excited. She didn't follow Penguin's exploits but she had heard about Penguin's rise to power. It was a rather fantastic story. Susan knew that the "Owl"and "Penguin" had been linked since the "early days" but she never imagined that they met during Elisaveta's _interview_.

" _Oswald_ was working as Fish's umbrella boy at the time, yes," Elisaveta answered with an icy tone.

Susan stiffened and wondered at Elisaveta's tone. Why would the Penguin dislike a name he had given himself?

"Sorry, continue."

"Alright..."

* * *

Fish was nursing a cocktail and chatting to a lanky looking boy. Whatever charitable mood Fish had when the interviews began was nearly gone, not that Lissy noticed. She was fairly bad at reading people.

"What's your story?" Fish asked.

Lissy hadn't liked the question. So she had simply answered, "Another boring sob story. I need the money, and I'll give you good work."

Lissy hadn't realized that her answer had played to Fish's temperament. Fish had never liked people who whined or wanted pity.

"What sort of work?"

"I know you need a new accountant. I can do that work."

Lissy knew full well the information hadn't spread around yet. She was counting on it.

Fish gave a devious smile and set down her drink. The young man at her side arched both eyebrows.

"How did you learn about that?"

"It's a nightclub people talk," Lissy shrugged, not wanting to get Zara into trouble.

"To _you?"_ Fish was right to be skeptical.

Lissy shook her head, "No, not to me,"

"Alright, alright," Fish was grinning, "A little gossip is fine, and that information wasn't anything I wanted kept a secret. You're resourceful, though, that's good. But, it doesn't tell me if you're any good with numbers."

"I kept Repin's tailors from going under for three years."

The young man leaned down and whispered something in Fish's ear, "My umbrella boy tells me that place still went under."

Lissy shrugged, "There was only so much I could do. He was a terrible businessman. You can test me, if you'd like. I'll pass." It might have been arrogant if Lissy's tone hadn't been so matter-of-fact.

Fish's umbrella boy shrugged in agreement when Fish glanced at him for validation. It had been common knowledge that Mr. Repin had been terrible at finances and too stubborn to delegate to Lissy every time.

"Alright then, you start tomorrow."

The only indication Lissy gave of surprise were two blinks, "Hours?"

"I'm flexible. You show up and get your work done and I don't really care about the when."

"Wages?"

"You said I could test you," Fish said, using Lissy's words against her, "We'll see how you do over the week, then we'll talk."

* * *

 **A/N:** I'm not usually the type to give advice about how to read my story because I think that stories have to be readable without any help but I'm going to point out that Elisaveta cannot be fully trusted to be a reliable narrator. Also, Dr. Susan is operating with limited and imperfect knowledge. So do keep that in mind. ;)


	2. Chapter 2: Hummingbird

**Chapter Two**

 **Hummingbird**

Susan was excited for her next session with Elisaveta. Though she was careful to temper that excitement. Everyone knew about Dr. Quiznel. You couldn't work at Arkham unless you had. Susan had no intention of turning to the dark-side, but that didn't make Elisaveta any less of an interesting character. Even if Susan still didn't understand the woman's motivations. Elisaveta was clearly very intelligent, if extremely socially awkward. What was it about working for Fish Mooney that had Elisaveta keeping the job when she had drifted from job to job for a while?

And of course there was the Penguin. Susan wondered just how much of a roll he played in Elisaveta's fall into the underbelly of crime and vise versa. She wondered what Elisaveta's feelings towards the Penguin were, both then and now and if they matched up with his feelings for her. Was Elisaveta the Harley Quinn to the Penguin's Joker? Or were they a regular Bonnie and Clyde?

"How did you and Penguin become friends?"

Elisaveta gave her the same somewhat sharp look that she gave every time Susan said "Penguin". Apparently she didn't like the nickname for him.

"It was his job to show me the ropes."

* * *

Lissy showed up bright and early for work the next day - or bright and early for a nightclub, at least. On her way out, Fish Mooney's umbrella boy had stopped her and told her to come in a few hours before the nightclub started so he could help her get the feel of her new job. He had introduced himself as Oswald Cobblepot. Lissy had thought it was a bit of a odd name, probably anglicized. She had agreed.

Telling her mother that she was working at a nightclub had been unpleasant, but necessary. Lissy hadn't been able to think of a suitable lie to tell her mother that would explain her working late hours so she just decided with the truth. Her mother had thrown an utter fit until Lissy had managed to calm her down enough to explain that she was working as an _accountant_. That had softened her mother up but she would never be completely happy that her "precious, baby girl" was running around with "hoodlums".

It was times like these that Lissy missed her grandfather, however a harsh man he had been, he hadn't ever let Milena coddle her daughter. Though he would have smacked Lissy around for her inability to keep down a job. On second thought, Lissy _didn't_ miss her grandfather that much.

So Lissy walked into the club a few hours before opening and was surprised to see that there were a fair number of people running around. Lissy didn't spot Zara and was relieved by that fact. She had no idea if Zara would take the news of her working for Mooney well or not. As a general rule Lissy preferred to avoid uncomfortable interactions.

Lissy stood awkwardly in the entrance, looking around for Oswald. Was she supposed to stand here and wait or go find him?

Her question was answered when the young man in question about bowled into her as he entered the nightclub.

"Miss Lazarev?" Oswald questioned clearly flustered. The two were nose to nose and Lissy showed no indication of moving or that their proximity even bothered her.

She tilted her head to the side, confused by his frazzled state, "Are you alright?" She asked as she ducked her head to the side, trying to peer around him to see if there was any trouble behind him.

"Quite alright, thank you!" Oswald practically blurted in her face. Lissy blinked in surprise and the doors slammed shut before she could get a proper look outside.

Oswald awkwardly shuffled around Lissy who was doing nothing to help him. Oswald might have at first suspected Lissy of taunting him but when she kept her big, clueless eyes on him, he seemed to realize that Lissy honestly had no idea that she was being rude and making him uncomfortable. Whatever cold, passive aggressive comment Oswald had prepared died on his lips and instead he gave Lissy his best interpretation of a smile.

"I hope you haven't been waiting long."

"Five minutes," Lissy bluntly informed him in the only tone Oswald had heard her speak in, an impassive one. As socially awkward as Oswald was, _he_ had at least understood social niceties. Lissy apparently did not.

"Ah, well... my apologies then."

"No worries," Lissy shrugged.

Oswald gave her another awkward smile, "Let me show you to your office then," and he shepherded her upstairs.

When Lissy pictured what the office of a nightclub that was also a front for the mafia might look like she had pictured a tiny cramped room with little light. And that was what she got, although she failed to factor in Fish Mooney's taste. With the exception of the cold, metal file cabinets with rather impressive looking locks on them the room was actually quite decedent. Hardwood floors, warm colored walls, a fancy looking desk, and a comfortable looking chair. There were no windows, the walls were undecorated, and the room could use another lamp or two but all in all Lissy was counting this as a victory.

"I hope the room is to your satisfaction?" Oswald asked with a bit of cheek. Lissy knew that she looked mildly impressed.

"Yes."

"You're free to personalize it as you like." Oswald told her, which Lissy thought was rather pointless. If she had money to spend on decorating an office, she wouldn't have been so desperate for work.

"The door to the room has a key, which will be in your custody. Fish has a spare, though I would recommend you not lose yours." Oswald continued. "The file cabinet have keys that are in your desk. That key ring is not to leave the room and you are not to leave the door unlocked unless you are in the room."

Lissy nodded her head.

Oswald pulled Lissy's chair out for her, an action that Lissy had only seen in the movies, and he began to show her exactly what sort of work was expected of her. Lissy had spent the night at the library, a library in the district over since she still wasn't allowed in the one from her district after the _incident_ that had gotten her fired. She had been researching accounting and generally brushing up. It had been almost a year since she had last dealt with accounting books and she didn't have any formal education to fall back on.

All things considered, the work that was expected of her wasn't hard. After Oswald walked her through it once, Lissy had it. Oswald even looked a bit impressed.

* * *

"Did you like impressing him?" Susan broke in, trying to wrap her mind around the relationship between Elisaveta and _Oswald_.

Elisaveta blinked and moved her eyes from the window to Susan. Susan noticed how Elisaveta tended to avoid eye contact.

"I suppose..."

"Why is that?"

Elisaveta shrugged, starting to fold into herself. Susan sighed. This was why she had Elisaveta telling her stories. She was a very closed off person otherwise.

"People like good work to be recognized."

"There wasn't anything special about impressing him?" Susan pressed.

Elisaveta's nose wrinkled in confusion, "Are you asking if I had a crush on him?"

Susan took note of the juvenile way Elisaveta phrased it and waited to see if Elisaveta would answer on her own, but apparently Elisaveta was prepared to wait for Susan to answer.

"Did you?"

"No."

"Did you find him attractive?"

"I don't really notice things like that."

Susan believed that easily.

"What did you notice, about him that is?"

"That he was polite and different. I thought he was interesting."

Interesting was probably as close as Susan would get Lissy to admit to being attracted to someone. Though she doubted Lissy felt attraction in the same way most people did. So Susan decided to take a different approach, "Did you want to be friends?"

"...I don't really think like that..."

Susan believed that as well. The only other friend Elisaveta had mentioned was Zara, and Zara appeared to do all the maintenance of that friendship.

Susan sighed, "So what happened next?"

"Oswald left. I got to work. I didn't see him until dinner."

* * *

Lissy often got lost in her work, at least, she did when it interested her. Numbers interested her, and the fact that these were _mafia_ numbers interested her more. When she got lost in her work, she lost track of time and usually forgot about things, like eating. Though she always kept a water bottle on her for hydration purposes. Lissy could admit that when there was a knock at her door that revealed Oswald, bearing dinner, she was more than a little surprised. Not only by his appearance but that so much time had passed.

He took her surprise the wrong way and floundered in the doorway, "I um, hope you don't think I'm being too forward, Miss Lazarev. I just noticed that you hadn't come down for dinner yet. Unless you did! And I didn't see you! I wasn't keeping an eye out," he laughed nervously, trying to play off his insecurity as a joke, "Maybe you just slipped past me, eh?"

Lissy missed every bit of insecurity and just stared at him confused, "I packed dinner," she informed him with no inflection to help Oswald out. She seemed determined to leave the socially awkward boy out to dry every time he felt like he was embarrassing himself in front of her.

"Oh um, right, sorry, I shouldn't have presumed..."

"No worries," Lissy shrugged, "I forget to eat. You did me a favor."

Oswald froze in the middle of his sentence and stared at Lissy, "Oh um, you're welcome, then," he recovered shakily. "Well, I hope you have a nice dinner, Miss Lazarev."

"Why are you going?"

Oswald again froze in the middle of his turn towards the door. His body couldn't stop as fast as his mind did and he all but rammed his face into the door, "W-what?" He tried to smoothly recover, putting his hand on the door. But he hadn't shut the door all the way when he came in, so it awkwardly shut with a loud thump.

"You haven't eaten dinner yet, have you?" Lissy asked, starting to feel uncomfortable herself.

"Well, no."

"Neither have I."

"Yes, um, you said that already...?"

Lissy pursed her lips, wishing that Oswald was more like Zara. Zara would have understood what Lissy meant.

"Are you asking me to eat with you?" Oswald said after an awkward pause. His voice was uncertain, wavering, as if he expected Lissy to tell him no and to laugh.

"If you want to..." Lissy asked in the same uncertain tone.

Oswald gave Lissy a grin that looked more genuine than the smiles he had given her earlier, or at least Lissy thought it looked a little more pleasant. There wasn't another chair in Lissy's room, so Oswald grabbed one from the hall.

* * *

"Your first day knowing him and you invited him to eat with you. That had to be big for you," Susan noted.

Elisaveta shrugged her shoulders, "It wasn't that hard."

"What do you mean?"

"He started it, so I just had to keep moving. Law of momentum and all."

It was a weird way to phrase it but Susan could understand Elisaveta's logic.

"What were your intentions with him?" Susan asked, knowing Elisaveta wouldn't take it the wrong way. "If you didn't like him and you didn't want to be friends, then why ask him to lunch?"

Elisaveta frowned slightly, "I was interested in him."

Susan was beginning to grasp how Elisaveta thought. For Elisaveta it was all about things, or people, that captivated her interest.

"What about him?" Susan asked, "What do you think his intentions were with you?"

"What did I think at the time or what did I learn his intentions were?"

"Both."

Elisaveta looked out the window again, "I didn't think much of his intentions at the time." Elisaveta told her, "But I put it together as we got closer. He wanted to use me. Oswald wasn't so ambitious back then - that was sort of my fault - but he didn't want to stay Fish's umbrella boy.

"What did he want?"

"Back then he wanted respect."

"And later?"

"Power."

"Now?"

Elisaveta's eyes narrowed, "Why do you want to know?"

"He appears to have been a very influential person in your life..." Susan trailed off, though she internally admitted that she had been digging a bit out of her own curiosity.

"That's true..."

Susan had to admit, Elisaveta looked a bit like an owl unruffling its feathers as she backed down.

"It didn't bother you that the Penguin was using you?"

"That was just Oswald's interpretation of a friend. It's not wrong."

Susan frowned, "What do you mean?"

"Friends do friends favors. They look out for each other's interests."

"Well yes..." Susan admitted.

Elisaveta wasn't _wrong,_ though that definition of friend always left a bad taste in Susan's mouth. It seemed so artificial to make friends with people whom you could benefit from. However, Susan could admit that there didn't seem anything artificial about the Penguin and Elisaveta's relationship _now_.

"Alright, continue."

"There's really not much more to say. We had dinner and talked. It wasn't all that personal of a conversation. I wasn't comfortable sharing and Oswald doesn't volunteer information unless it suits his purposes. We talked about shared interests. We read a lot of the same books, so we talked about that. Zara had laughed at how I had gotten fired from the library so I shared that story. He shared this story about-" Elisaveta ceased talking.

Susan suspected the story involved illegal activity.

"It was funny."

Susan also suspected only Elisaveta could say 'it was funny' with a completely straight face and _mean_ it.

"Is that how your days usually went?"

"Yes. I arrived a few hours before the bar opened and went to work. Oswald would show up with his dinner and we'd talk. Then shortly after the club opened, I'd leave. After the first week Oswald managed to figure when I left and he'd walk me to the door."

Susan raised an eyebrow.

"What?" Elisaveta asked, her eyebrows puckering together.

"Did you think Oswald liked you?"

Elisaveta's nose crinkled in confusion. Susan knew the moment Elisaveta realized what she was getting at because the look dropped, "Because if a boy likes you, he might walk you to the door." Elisaveta said.

Susan hid a smile behind her hand. She knew high-schoolers with better social skills. It was almost endearing.

"Oswald wasn't interested in me," Elisaveta shook her head, "He liked my company and was trying to make friends."

"Trying?"

"Oswald usually makes his friends through favors. He didn't have anything on me and I didn't need anything from him."

"So he had to make friends the conventional way?"

Susan had a hard time imagining the 'king of Gotham' playing nice with a mousy accountant. However, Elisaveta's version of the Penguin was far from what Susan saw in the newspaper. The image Elisaveta painted was funny, dare Susan admit it, even _cute_. Susan knew she was treading on dangerous ground if she thought the 'king of Gotham' and his queen were _cute_.

"So what changed?" Susan asked, changing the subject.

A pinched look crossed Elisaveta's face, "On the third week, Zara saw me leaving with Oswald."

* * *

Lissy and Oswald were walking towards the front door, in an animated discussion about Shylock from "Merchant of Venice". Oswald held that Shylock was a fool and Lissy held that he had been exploited by an unjust law system - they both agreed that Shylock wasn't _really_ the villain of the story and was actually fully within his rights to extract his "pound of flesh".

Lissy hadn't noticed Zara, decked out in one of the most flamboyant outfits Lissy would ever see (until the Riddler showed her his first draft of his own costume), getting off the stage. Nor had she noticed that Zara _had_ noticed them. The girl had made a beeline for them, moving faster than anyone wearing heels of that height had any right to move.

Zara threw herself onto Lissy's back, locking her arms around the smaller girl's neck. If Lissy hadn't caught the sudden movement out of the corner of her eye, the two girls would have ended up sprawled over the floor - or on top of Oswald.

"Lissy!" Zara squealed too loudly in the trapped girl's ear. "You always told me you would only be caught here dead, and here you are breathing and everything," Zara pouted, snuggling against Lissy's wild hair.

Lissy wondered if it were possible for the ground to swallow her up. Mrs. Abramova had told Lissy since she was ten that one day a demon would drag her straight down to Hell. Lissy wondered if she could make a deal with said demon to take her away _now_.

"You have some explaining to do!" Zara pouted. Lissy was fairly sure Zara was tipsy, "You didn't even come to my first performance and here you are on no occasion at all!"

Oswald was staring at the two girls wide eyed and growing alarmingly red. Zara saw the look and Lissy could _hear_ her smirking from over her head. Zara unwound her arms from Lissy's neck and wound them instead around her middle.

"Lissy," Zara whined in the voice she used to use to get boys to buy her things back in high-school, "Who is he?" She drew out 'he' longer than was necessary.

Lissy stiffened almost comically, "Stop it, Zara," she instructed her friend coldly, "You're making Oswald uncomfortable."

"Oh, I don't think that's discomfort~" Zara _purred_ , "But glad to know your friend has a name, or is he _not_ a friend?"

Lissy's eyes flickered downward but no demon appeared so it appeared she had to deal with this mess. "Zara..." her passive voice has a slight warning edge to it.

Zara reluctantly let go of Lissy's waist though she threw an arm over her shoulder and leaned against her side in a way Lissy was fairly sure was improper.

Oswald coughed, a lot. Until Lissy was looking at him with concern and Zara looked like a cat that got the cream.

"Are you two friends?" Oswald managed to ask, after his coughing fit had lessened.

"More than friends."

Oswald eyes rounded.

"No." Lissy deadpanned at the same time.

Oswald now looked confused.

"You're so mean Lissy!"

"Yes, and you're weird."

"Rude!"

"Honest." Lissy corrected.

"Fine," Zara dragged the word out with a whine, "Lissy and I are childhood _friends_ , though apparently not so close that you wouldn't share with me that you had a date!"

"Date?!" Oswald spluttered.

"Is this not a date?" Zara asked, now sounding honestly confused.

"You thought this was a date and you just tried to tell him you're my girlfriend?"

"Hinted at it," Zara defended, "And it was to teach you a lesson. I taught you girl code!"

Lissy made a pinched expression, "You made that up."

"No, I didn't! Every girl knows the girl code!" Zara practically wailed, only keeping her voice low enough that they weren't drawing attention.

Lissy didn't bother to argue. The two had argued about the non-existent "girl code" since middle school. "Oswald works here, Zara," Lissy told her nosy friend patiently.

"I know that," Zara sniffed, before giving Lissy a suspicious look. She gave Oswald an apologetic look, before she rounded on Lissy in her 'concerned friend' tone, "Look, Lis, not to question your taste in men or anything. Lord knows I like the dangerous type too, but this is a little mu-"

"Not a date. He's coworker."

Zara's eyes rounded. "Coworker?!" Zara spun Lissy around to face her and gave Lissy a shake that disoriented her. "You're working for Fish Mooney?!"

Taking pity on her, Oswald jumped in, "Um, yes, Miss Zara, Lissy is a very dedicated employee."

Zara's eyes snapped to Oswald and the poor boy gulped. Zara could be intimidating when she wanted to be - not that Oswald had that much spine at the time.

"Is she now?"

"Y-yes m'am, she's the accountant, she does g-great work." Oswald slinked back a little, not fully wanting to abandon Lissy to Zara's clutches, not that Lissy would have blamed him, terribly, if he had.

Zara's eyes slid back to Lissy and she gave the poor girl another shake.

"Oh, dear," Oswald groaned, noticing Lissy's paling face.

"You work for Fish Mooney and you're dressing like that?!" And Zara was back to her usual self.

* * *

 **A/N:** My boyfriend had dubbed Elisaveta x Oswald "bird lovers", God bless his punny soul. Reviews are the bread and butter of an author!~


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